Exploring effective factors in reducing the fall of hospitalized patients: A systematic review

Abstract

Background and Objectives: Patient's fall is one of the factors threatening a patient's health in hospitals and medical centers, which in some cases can lead to disability or death. Therefore, this study was conducted to systematically examine the factors affecting the reduction of patient falls in the hospital. Materials and Methods: This systematic review was conducted to identify the factors affecting the reduction of patient's fall in the hospitals based on the Prisma protocol. On this basis, all English-language articles published in this field from 1990 to the end of September 2019 were extracted during a search in four international databases and publishers including Web of Science, PubMed, Scopus, Science Direct, and Google Scholar. Articles were searched and screened by three researchers independently and finally, the extracted articles were analyzed and classified through thematic content analysis. Results: According to the Prisma protocol, 6227 studies were extracted, of which 32 studies were finally included in the study process. Then, the thematic analysis of the studies showed that factors such as education, exercise, attention to physiological factors and treatment of the disease, environmental safety, use of fall detection device, and patient risk assessment were effective in reducing falls. Conclusions: The findings show that existing approaches to reduce falls have a favorable role. It is necessary to use several methods of fall prevention at the same time, in order to control most aspects and factors affecting the fall and reduce the rate of fall.